


Nor Iron Bars a Cage

by SylvanWitch



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Curtain Fic, M/M, Post-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-22
Updated: 2019-12-22
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:14:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 804
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21636436
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SylvanWitch/pseuds/SylvanWitch
Summary: Thomas and James observe Christmas with their own, private worship.
Relationships: Captain Flint | James McGraw/Thomas Hamilton
Comments: 6
Kudos: 42
Collections: Spicy Advent - Multi-fandom Porn Advent Calendar 2019





	Nor Iron Bars a Cage

**Author's Note:**

> I like to imagine Thomas and James as old men, having cowed (James) and bribed (Thomas) the guards into a benign neglect. This is my version of their 'happily ever after.'
> 
> The title is taken from Richard Lovelace's "To Althea, from Prison."

The scent of coffee woke him from one of his gentler dreams, fire consuming the land almost beatifically, a cleansing destruction.

He levered himself upward slowly, his old bones and aching joints cracking and twinging with the effort.

“Coffee,” he offered by way of morning greeting—observation, not demand—and Thomas turned to him with a pleased smile, something of the canary-eater in it.

“Happy Christmas,” Thomas said, handing James a steaming cup.

“Do I want to know what you traded for such extravagance?” James asked, waggling an eyebrow suggestively. His voice was rough with sleep, and he cleared it before bringing the cup to his lips for a long, grateful draught. It burned his mouth on the way down like a memory of his dream of fire.

“Nothing I valued,” Thomas answered lightly, turning away.

James set the cup on the crate that served as a nightstand and stopped him with a cup-warmed hand on his wrist, tangling his fingers with Thomas’, pulling him back toward the bed they shared.

Thomas came with the barest show of reluctance, smile secret and a little sad. There were many things they weren’t allowed in this house of the forgotten: 

They were forbidden to share a room.

They were prohibited any luxuries that might turn their minds from the salvation of their souls to the fleshly pleasures that would damn them.

They were banned from any show of brotherly—or otherwise—affection.

He leaned down to meet James’ kiss, reveling in the flavor of his mouth, hot and bitter, like the man himself, mellowed though he had been by age and use, and felt, as always, the stirring in his belly that presaged a deeper desire.

“We haven’t time,” Thomas murmured, pulling away only a little, just far enough to cup James’ beloved face between his age-spotted hands. “We must attend the morning service.”

Even as he finished his sentence, the tower bell pealed, calling them to worship.

James’ hands at Thomas' waist tightened. “Come back to bed,” he suggested, spreading his legs to pull Thomas closer still. The thin cotton of his shirttails did little to hide the evidence of his need.

“We must go to worship,” Thomas averred, trying—but not with much sincere effort—to step out of James’ grasp.

“Yes,” James answered, eyes darkening. “We must,” and he leaned forward and placed his open mouth against Thomas’ belly. The heat and damp even through the fabric of his shirt made Thomas shiver and then groan, and almost without volition he found his knee on the bed, found himself pressing James down onto the thin ticking, found James’ mouth, wild and hungry, and his hands, careful but demanding, pulling at his clothes.

It was the work of moments to push up James’ shirt and to free Thomas’ half-hard cock from his breeches, to press their cocks together in James’ big, work-callused hand.

The ageless rhythm they fell into was easy with long practice, despite age and infirmity, and pleasure coiled through him, building heavy in his belly, a familiar tightening making him grit his teeth against a shout as James pulled him over the edge and came with him, muffling his own cry against Thomas’ shoulder, where his teeth left an impression of his pleasure behind as a reminder.

Spent, Thomas let himself be cradled against James’ side, content to hear the great and steadfast heart pounding sure and steady beneath his ear. It muffled the sounds of footsteps in the corridor, the shrill chivvying of the guards herding stragglers toward chapel.

“They’ll miss us,” Thomas warned.

“Let them come looking,” James answered, something wicked in his tone.

Thomas couldn’t even pretend to be scandalized: The staff had long since learned to avoid their room if Captain Flint chose not to emerge when summoned.

James produced the cup, coffee still warm, and offered it to Thomas, an earthly sacrament but no less sacred for the smile in his eyes, which promised forever as surely as any other kind of communion might.

As he took a sip, savoring the richness, Thomas sent up a prayer that God might be merciful on this Christmas morn and remember his lost sons, unrepentant but also unbroken, their love most certainly made in His image, no matter what the ministers might say.

For his part, James watched Thomas swallow and licked his own lips reflexively, eager for a second taste of the coffee, this time from his lover’s willing mouth. There was no thought in his mind of God or sin or the significance of the day, but his observations were a kind of prayer, asking no quarter of the world or God and giving none, save this room, the man in his arms, and another day beneath the sun, breathing the same air, and loving each other.


End file.
